Republican boycott casts long shadow over session, Oregon’s political future

Even after a compromise ended Senate Republicans’ six-week walkout, the historic protest of the 2023 session left lawmakers with little time to consider hundreds of bills and will cast a long shadow over Oregon politics, observers say.

Republican and Democratic caucus leaders both claimed victory over the hard-fought deal, which brought enough Republicans back to the Senate floor to resume votes June 15. The boycott, the longest in Oregon history, had threatened to tank the session including approval of a state budget.

The detente late in the session left state lawmakers with just 11 days to address a mountain of bills that had piled up before the Legislature had to legally wrap Sunday. They kept a frantic pace to do so.

The Capitol buzzed with anticipation Saturday morning as legislators, some wearing Hawaiian shirts in celebration, hoped to close the roller coaster of a session. That effort fell short, however, after votes in both chambers were delayed for hours due to last-minute disagreements among Democrats about a little noticed land use bill.

Both chambers will return Sunday to wrap up action on a final few bills.

In the end, however, the paralysis from the six-week Republican walkout was muted. That was because, unlike during previous walkouts, when boycotting lawmakers remained far from Salem, Republican senators this year showed up regularly to the Capitol to take part in policy and budget committee meetings, where key lawmaking gets ironed out. So when a quorum returned to the Senate floor 10 days ago, hundreds of bills were ready for final votes.

While thankful for the compromise, Rep. Pam Marsh, D-Ashland, said the frenzy wasn’t ideal for thoughtful lawmaking, calling it “not pretty.”

When the dust settles, lawmakers will have to reckon with strained relationships across the aisle and within their own parties. Nine Senate Republicans and one Independent may also face disqualification from reelection after they violated a voter-approved law intended to deter boycotts.

Mark Henkels, a political science professor at Western Oregon University, said this year’s walkout was “categorically different” than those in years past.

He said the protest posed a rocky start for rookie Senate President Rob Wagner, D-Lake Oswego, who succeeded Peter Courtney, the state’s longest serving president of the chamber.

Wagner and Senate Republican Leader Tim Knopp, of Bend, were “at odds” from the get-go, Henkels said. He expects Republicans will again resort to obstruction tactics in future sessions.

“I’m not sure how he’s going to deal with it,” Henkels said of Wagner.

Nevertheless, lawmakers managed to pass budgets for all state agencies and a host of priorities and pet projects as well as lottery- and debt-funded capital projects and programs.

They also passed a flurry of legislation to borrow $1 billion for the construction of a new Interstate 5 bridge over the Columbia River, tighten restrictions on how much landlords can increase rents each year, overhaul the state’s broken public defense system, provide a bipartisan $10.2 billion base budget for schools and allow Oregonians to pump their own gas.

On Saturday, lawmakers also passed a package revamping how children are taught to read, a tax credit for semiconductor research, protections for the use of naloxone to reverse potentially fatal opioid overdoses and a state child tax credit to tamp down child poverty.

First-year Gov. Tina Kotek was able to achieve signature wins on her highest priorities, including housing, homelessness and mental health, with notable bipartisan support.

Still, the dysfunction among lawmakers was palpable and magnified by the near-constant clanging and banging of construction work that shut about two-thirds of the Capitol during the session. While the Senate drew attention for its long, hostile walkout, the House Republican caucus also experienced a behind-the-scenes crisis Thursday. Rep. Shelly Boshart Davis of Albany resigned from her role as deputy Republican leader and Rep. E. Werner Reschke of Medford resigned as whip.

It’s unclear why. Spokespersons for each lawmaker declined to say when contacted by The Oregonian/OregonLive. Both resigned, however, on the same day that they skipped the House vote on the controversial reproductive healthcare bill that had been central to Senate Republicans’ walkout. The amended bill passed.

In the Senate, Wagner and Knopp traded near-daily barbs in press releases throughout the walkout: Wagner condemned Republicans for shirking their duty to show up for work; Knopp railed on Wagner’s politics as “extreme.”

“They killed 37 bills in our agenda. So my question would be, why would we be a speedbump on the road to them achieving their agenda?” Knopp told The Oregonian/OregonLive in May.

However, the boycott may inflict a high cost on Senate Republicans.

Knopp is up for reelection in a battleground district next year and may be disqualified from holding another term. Knopp, along with Independent Sen. Brian Boquist of Dallas and eight other Republicans, accrued more than 10 unexcused absences in violation of Measure 113, which a majority of Oregon voters approved last year.

The measure had a potentially serious drafting error, however. It said that lawmakers who are unexcused for 10 days or more aren’t eligible to hold office “for the term following the election after the member’s current term is completed.” Lawmakers’ current terms don’t end until January 2025 or January 2027, whereas the next elections, in November 2024 and 2026, will be held before their current terms are completed. That means senators could be eligible for another four-year term before being disqualified.

The other potentially disqualified senators are: Lynn Findley of Vale, Bill Hansell of Athena, Daniel Bonham of The Dalles, Cedric Hayden of Fall Creek, Dennis Linthicum of Klamath Falls, Art Robinson of Cave Junction, Kim Thatcher of Keizer and Suzanne Weber of Tillamook, all Republicans.

Knopp, Boquist and others plan to challenge the law in court.

To secure Senate Republicans’ return to the floor to provide the necessary quorum to do business, Democrats cut programs expanding abortion access at universities and in rural parts of Oregon that were planned in House Bill 2002, the sweeping reproductive and gender-affirming care bill. They also limited, but did not eliminate, medical providers’ ability to provide abortions to patients younger than 15 without parental consent.

Democrats also killed part of House Bill 2005 that would have raised the age to purchase most firearms from 18 to 21 and the entirety of a proposed constitutional amendment affirming the right to a same sex marriage, gender-affirming care and an abortion.

The compromise received criticism from both sides of the aisle, but especially from conservatives.

The Oregon Firearms Federation condemned Knopp and House Minority Leader Vikki Breese-Iverson, R-Prineville, for allowing Democrats to pass legislation Thursday outlawing home-made firearms without serial numbers, known as “ghost guns.” The group has sued state government over gun laws narrowly approved by a majority of Oregon voters in November.

“The Democrats got everything they wanted, the conservative Republicans and Oregonians got screwed,” the organization wrote in an email to supporters.

About a dozen House Republicans boycotted the chambers Thursday, but enough attended to pass the proposal and others.

After the compromise, Bonham refused to participate in any Senate votes on the amended reproductive rights and gun control proposals, which now await expected signing by Kotek.

“I am disappointed that I potentially sacrificed my Senate seat for this walkout when it did not ultimately stop these unconstitutional and unlawful bills from moving forward,” Bonham wrote in a newsletter.

Voters overwhelmingly approved Measure 113 in fall 2022 in response to Republicans’ increasing use of boycotts, a tactic they say is necessary as Democrats retain their longstanding control of the House, Senate and governor’s office.

Republicans are able to grind work to a halt because of a quirk in the state constitution: Oregon is one of just a handful of states requiring the presence of two-thirds of lawmakers for votes in both chambers. Most states require a simple majority.

Senate Republicans fled as far as Idaho and Montana in 2019 during a nine-day boycott over a proposal to create a greenhouse gas cap-and-trade system, which the protest successfully killed. Senate Republicans tanked the 2020 legislative session in protest of proposed climate goals that then-Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, later enacted in an executive order.

The next year, Republicans walked out of the Senate to oppose Brown’s COVID-19 restrictions and in the House over Democrats’ gerrymandered congressional districts.

Recent analogs are rare in other states: Legislators have boycotted state capitols in Texas in 2021 as well as Wisconsin and Indiana in 2011, according to Ballotpedia.

Last week, Democrats including Marsh signed onto a proposal to change Oregon’s quorum rules to require a simple majority to conduct business. Marsh said the bill is “symbolic” and probably won’t advance this session. But Democrats will hold discussions after the session ends to chart a path forward, she said.

–Grant Stringer; gstringer@oregonian.com; @Stringerjourno